One of Tori Amos's ambitions was to record with an orchestra. Now she's done that with Gold Dust, a collection of her greatest hits rerecorded with Holland's 52-piece Metropole Orkest, she's fulfilling another goal and touring with them. The Royal Albert Hall, her only UK date, is made for just this sort of grand production, but of all the people on stage, only one is of interest to the Toriphiles who fill the place and give her a standing ovation on entrance.
To be fair, she gives a good deal back. This year is the 20th anniversary of her debut album, Little Earthquakes, and the show celebrates her career with a generous helping of songs from the entire two decades. There are a few major omissions – no Professional Widow or Cornflake Girl – but she revisits most of her key albums, tunnelling into each song with the intensity of someone singing them for the first time. It isn't just the fans who are transported by her performance; behind her, a French horn player avidly bobs his head to the melodies rippling out of Amos's piano.
She and the Metropole are little short of wonderful together. The orchestra adds cinematic drama to Amos's raw vocals, in effect creating new songs. By contrast, when she sings Ribbons Undone with no backing, the song feels orphaned. The greater the concentration of strings and brass (on Yes, Anastasia, there's practically a soundclash with Amos and her piano), the more viscerally thrilling. Silent All These Years swells and crescendos – a suitably triumphant setting for a tune about finding the courage to speak up. Her 12-year-old daughter, watching from the balcony, has quite a role model in this perpetually surprising artist.
